Two Evils
by Hitorah
Summary: "This is probably the first time in your life that you've heard this, Natasha, but the lesser of two evils is you." - A child doesn't mean domesticity. Welcome to a more serious, sometimes dark look at the idea of a Clint/Natasha child. -Clintasha/BlackHawk/BlackEye. Oneshot collection. EXTREMELY sensitive topics in CH 1.-
1. Two Evils

I want to thank the 500+ people who read and those who reviewed my previous story,_ 5AM. _I was so surprised to come home from a road trip to see the story had gotten read so much- I was used to fanfictions being popular if a chapter got 75 views! What a difference three years makes. Y'all are a great community, you really are.

"5AM" _will_ be continued due to requests to rewrite the same morning through my-version-of-Natasha's point of view. Until then, I hope this will hold you over. :)

What is this? Well, my good Hawaiian friend (who will probably inspire many stories the way she talks) and I have mused over how realistic the idea a Blackeye/Blackhawk/Clintasha child was. Personally, I can't see there being any sort of joy around the situation at all- not for 'tasha. This is not your normal "Clintasha child" oneshot with loving words and eventually a baby; no, not at all. Y'all have been warned.  
This one _may_ be continued if I get any ideas in the same little "universe," but I have no immediate plans. I'm just writing as the ideas come along. It's great to relieve stress!

* * *

**" Two Evils "**

Weeks and months and years were odd creatures. Just as it could be hard to spot the growth of an animal until he/she wasn't seen regularly, it was hard to recall just how long it had been since he had seen certain people until they shocked him with a sudden return. The days went by on the calendar, the months name changed on the cell phone, the hand prepared to write a new number at the end of the four digit year. The mind stored photos of comrades and enemies alike, photos that were updated - like online databases - with every ensuing encouter.

Like a shocked blogger looking at a sudden update to a movie star who had kept secret about roles, he was surprised to see a familiar face walking back through his door. Quite surprised to see her face above all others. Well, he supposed it would be silly to think she would fear him and thus avoid him- momentarially, yes, while her ankle was trapped in piping and he losing his control- but long term? No. Like a police or army dog, this woman learned to fear nothing, could be trained to ignore what had once been used against her. Should the same stunt happen again no doubt she would have shot him through the skull before _the other guy_ ever came out. The dog metaphor was so glaringly accurate that it fightened him, made him wonder just what she was before...

It had taken a moment to recognize her, with her hair grown past her shoulders and flattened down. (It had been barely hiding her ears back in the day... Just how much time has passed?) The red color (really, the color red was a good one, it suited her, though the line unsettled her- no doubt, something of Loki's doing. Or, perhaps he thought too deeply into that and it was part of her history that he wanted to know nothing about.) and the sound of her voice, however, had made it clear; this was, indeed, the same person and she was as strong as ever.

"How's about we forget this false name on a form made by an agent," -made by an agent no where near Coulson's skill. Smiling despite the memory of the fallen comrade, his voice was its usual soft volume and octave with the disarming charm that he doubted had any affect on her, if she noticed it at all. The paperwork was placed down on his personal desk and turned down so the false name accompanied by the real face could be ignored. "...and I speak to you normally."

"So be it."

How he wanted to laugh warmly at the thoughts he was having; to laugh, yes, for they were out of place. So many cases he had worked on before as a doctor, a medic, as the person who could help. Reactions of all sorts were ingrained in his memory even if the faces of patients themselves had long faded away. Depending on the diagnosis and the patient's situation the way they took the news, whatever it may be, could be vastly different. Sometimes there was joy and other times anguish. Stronger souls had the light of determination and the will in their eyes while weaker ones pleaded for a liquid or pill-shaped cure. The more well off the country, the more the latter occured. Huh, odd, that the citizens would be so spoiled by technology that they lost faith in their bodies. (Perhaps that was what made those with shadowed pasts so resilient; they knew they could trust themselves to make it through.)

Shaking away those meandering thoughts, Banner tapped the papers on his desk to flatten them. No longer was he essentially on the edge of the Earth, though he longed to help those he knew needed it. He remained in Manhattan, in a private office that didn't technically exist on any records (save for Stark's and SHIELD's). Along with various research the eccentric Iron Man conducted, there were diseases in the area believed to have been caused by the foreign (alien) matter that had taken so long to clean up; easily cured but his own expertise was needed. Up close. Not his usual forte but he consented. Not to SHIELD but to the smiling patients.

Well... all but one smiled at him.

Her face wasn't even in his direction; she stood by the spacious windows (which did wonders in making the room feel far larger than it already was) with her back to the wall, her eyes on the city, her arms crossed over her chest, her clothing the business attire seen in the false papers. By all means, it appeared as if it was _her_ preparing for an interrogation and he was the target.

_Best to get this over with._

"...I have to deny the request for treatment."

"_What._" The speed at which she moved, even the smallest of motions, still stunned him. In a flash, her head was turned and those vivid blue eyes threatened to bore holes into his body. Those eyes. As perfect as her exterior was, those eyes were the ones of a spooked horse, powerful and ready to strike and run wild. If she were a horse he would approach with a that soothing voice, a gentle offered hand and a few clicks of his tongue. He was no fool. To approach her was to court death.

However, the two of them knew who would win in a fight, who had _almost_ won the time before... There was nothing for him to worry about. (So why was he nervous?)

If he removed the bias and viewed her through the same lens which he examined patients, he understood her plight. His movement was naturally slow; jerky motions did little to keep down adrenaline he didn't need. With a soft hand he removed his glasses, holding them by the bridge while he brought the other hand up to brush back a few stray strands of hair.

Oh, where to begin... This was why doctors should never be take cases involving friends or family. There was too great a risk, whether the outcome was consult of surgery. Bias and familiarity, it didn't nothing but hinder. "Miss Romanoff, I may not be able to read people the way you do but I am pretty smart." To say the least, while he spoke with that calm, hypnotising tone he had perfected. Each word was carefully ennunciated. "Given what I know about you and what I have seen, it is not hard to form a mental picture of the situation. I'm not sure if it is trust, Miss Romanoff, or history that you work on but there is only one person who could fit either bill." She did not interrupt; he continued under the assumption he was correct. "Going on that notion, I must assume... and I must deny."

"Explain yourself." The woman said smoothly, as if they were talking about the weather. Banner would have preferred a snarl, a growl; it would have better suited the words.

"Those papers are possibly for your next assignment; who can track a woman who doesn't exist? You've come to me for secrecy. You've all the money in your world, Natasha, and could easily find someone else to give you what you want. Going to someone other than myself means one of two things- public records alerting those keeping tabs on you or the false identity being found out. There would be no winning for you. I, on the other hand, could perform and then forget this ever happened. You would need to give me no money, you feel as if you have a debt."

"Still not an explanation."

Gingerly, he put his spectacles back on but kept his eyes closed. Never look an angry horse in the eye. "While it is only you standing in my office, two of my friends are now involved." At once, his hands rose in a defensive gesture. "You prefer the term ally, I am well aware, but allow me this once.

"Either way I go, there is a friend I will have turned my back on. Now I must consider the mental faculties of both friends- both strong and capable people, humans who fought as hard as the super human. However, _you _are far stronger. If one breaks a methaphorical pane of glass in the maze of your mind, you fix it before they get through, essentially cutting the intrusion in half, killing it like we did the Chutari. There is a softer heart in my other friend, one not as isolated. While an assassin, and psychiatry could have a field day with examining his preference for the more primal bow over the more efficient gun, there is a propensity for him to rid the area or find an area low on civilians, innocents. Not that you seek out collateral damage, Miss Romanoff, but we all recall seeing him fighting to unload that bus during the start of the attack."

The second hand of the clock on the wall seemed to be in sync with his heart, a steady thrum, regular, _calm_... he commended himself for being so controlled under that murderous (yet strikingly lovely) gaze. _You can't win,_ that was the only reason why he hadn't been grabbed, pinned, convinced or forced. The other guy recalled the fight with her- and would probably want to show how he could get the upper hand. (Though, he could see how so many other men and even perhaps some women had lost to that gaze.)

"I have two choices here, Miss Romanoff." The professional in him switched titles in hopes of making the decision easier. It wasn't Natasha he was dealing with, it was one of the thousands of Romanoffs (Romanov, Romanova...) that were alive at that moment. Just ignore those eyes... "The aftershocks of what I would have to do... I am sorry, I cannot accept. Not that you do not matter. You will make it through this day with your walls intact but I cannot put him through that hell of knowing what you had asked to take away- a child, my friend, a child. Eventually he would learn, Miss Romanoff, they all do. If I didn't personally who the father was... if it was an assignment mistake, protection mishap..."

Chuckling in a way that he wasn't sure was stressed or saddened and giving a smile of the same confused emotion, Banner picked up his head and was able to look her right in those dangerous eyes. "This is probably the first time in your life that you've heard this, Natasha, but the lesser of two evils is you."

There was absolute anger in the way the door to his nonexistant office was slammed shut. Her stride was calm, the shoes athletic and silent, but the sound- she might as well have brought out her gun and fired.


	2. The Right Partner

So, I've decided to continue this Clintasha kid idea. Here's a promise; it won't be as dark as the first chapter from here on out.

The 'chapters' have no grand central plot, no villain or problem to take care of. Just various related drabbles, oneshots and/or events in this little universe where I toy with the Clintasha kid.  
I have plans for five chapters. Each will center on one of the Avengers, minus Thor- I'm still really working on my idea for him. I hope to fit him in but... I'm not sure. No promises. If you all have any suggestions of your own (for Thor or perhaps Fury or a-still-alive-Coulson) feel free to send them to me.

Chapter one, _Two Evils_, was the Banner-centric chapter.  
You'll have to see for yourselves who the later chapters center around. Just keep an eye on the titles.

Thank y'all for reading!

**6/21/2012 ; thanks to the anonymous reviewer who made me realize that I was writing "Steve Rodgers" instead of his rightful name, "Rogers." I really didn't realize I'd done that. XD**

* * *

**" The right partner "**

The new world was a hard one to understand. Where life had its twists and turns and hardships before now there seemed to be a new level of complication _on top_ of what he had once known. Letters and notes turned into digital communication of so many kinds that he had no hopes of understanding it all, even if he studied until the day he died (and hopefully stayed dead that time). Microwaves, aplliances and computers turned into gadgets so numerous that he got their names confused until he was talking about food when he meant to ask about internet. ...Whatever that was. Was it a central place, a reactor such as that under Stark's plant? It was easier to think about the massive, computer obsession as a physical object than an imaginary place that manifested itself in wires and circuits. Technology declassified and clandestine, solid and experimental, _hush hush_ or _exalt_- there was too much to take in.

In a way, he was naught but a child, a mind made fragile by time thus made incapable of understanding at first glance, even with a coherent explanation (where English was _actually_ spoken, not those seven syllable words that had definitions as long as a college thesis). Thermonuclear dynamics, spectrometers, cluster recognition, anti-protons, nuclear reactor cores...  
Thank the god who had preserved him that baseball was still around. There were a few changes here and there and an entire new cast of players but it was still baseball. America's pastime. American Football also proved to be a source of relief; it got the other men in the team (whoever was at the tower at the time, with it being an incredibly rare occurrence for everyone to be there) talking in terms he completely understood. (That embarrassment after the Flying Monkeys reference was to be forgotten. Was it truly his fault he'd sounded a little too eager?)

At least he wasn't alone in this unique form of confusion; _the child_ shared the confused looks and often ducked her head down to sneak away to a quieter, simpler corner of the tower.

Better still, the child was beginning to take interest in the games.

It was still a web of mystery, everything about this child. Rogers wasn't sure if what he had been told at first was truth or if the explanation he'd heard later was the real story- he'd given up. Really, did his life depend on knowing the girl's origins? No, it did not. Best to not question it, best to simply accept that there was that child living there, under Banner's careful guardianship, always wandering around, finding her way from floor to floor under careful watch when she thought she was clever and unseen. (She seemed to like to do that, to slip away, out of sight, often found huddled in some corner or strange hideaway, as comfortable as a kitten in the dark, sometimes perfectly aware and other times fast asleep.)

The girl's hair color was an odd one; in some lighting it wanted to be a pale red, in others it wanted to be a pale brown. Perhaps this was some new color come about in the population since his day or maybe his eyes were just growing accustomed to light again after seventy years of sleep. The latter was likely enough. Why question it?

It was a relief to have someone else that understood his plight, even if that person was a child... Someone. It was someone.

When those talks on the lower floors, those equipped with that strange holographic computer modeling software, got into those words he'd learned as a new form of scientific English, Steve would leave with the two geniuses making understanding noises from behind him. Sometimes, if she had been hiding out nearby, the girl would follow, coming out of her hiding place and staying to one side of him, still as silent as that kitten, her bounding stride even resembling that of a cat.

"Is there a ballgame? I like ballgames."

It made him feel like some sort of uncle or something, the way she would ask while tapping his hand, her substitute for pulling on the sleeve of his leather jacket or the tucked-in hem of his shirt. (Then again, his hand was easier for her petite arms to reach. His sleeves and hem were too high.)

"I believe the Nationals play the Yankees tonight." Yes, yes, he could do this; the Yankees were still the Yankees and their history had become more glorified than they had been before. Astounding. The Nationals were a different team, an upstart group surging throught he league to prove their worth after the last team (and another one in between) had left the nation's capitol.

"Tonight?"

"Yes, at seven. It's just the afternoon now."

The simply girl nodded and then lowered her head; there were no pouts or tantrums from this child. Or he was never around for them. A quiet girl, the tilt of her head and eyes showed her emotion well enough. Oh, he hated to see those brightly colored eyes icing over. With nothing to do, no promised events, Steve swore he saw the same lonesome feeling that plagued him enter her eyes. It was hell. On one hand, he was in a world where no one he knew was still alive; being lonesome was inevetable. On the other, there was a world out there full of people this child would probably never meet. _She is safe here,_ Banner had said. _Her association with us may put her on the radar of other dangerous groups. Best she... remains in our care as to not draw their attention_.

Whatever you say, Doc, whatever you say.

On nights where he couldn't sleep, remembering little speech from the ever-calm banner made Steve wonder if the "rumor" was true, if the child was, indeed, related to the Widow. Wait... was that a rumor or the official explanation or a cover story? He'd never gotten that straightened out. There had been no formal meeting, it had been too confusing... Just best to forget and treat the child with a clean slate. The mystery child he shared his plights with wasn't that confusing garble of SHIELD talk; she was Mariposa. The girl who liked ballgames. That was it.

"Say..." Rogers began as he knelt down, dropping his eyes to her level. The girl looked up, her eyes more curious than anything else. _Let's keep it that way._ "Here's an idea, why don't we go for a bit of a walk, Mari?" Curse his inability to properly roll the _r_, though she didn't seem to mind. "The weather is lovely, not too warm or cold. That sound like a plan?"

"Will we be back for the ballgame?"

"I promise."

A promise he would keep, no matter how small. Hiding the way his heart felt as if it had been harpooned, Rogers pat the girl on the head before heading over to the elevator. Though it was still new to him, the idea that a building could talk, he'd seen stranger things. (Such as alien fighters and whales coming from a portal in the sky.) A talking building was only normal to him since he happened to live there. If that made any sense.  
"Jarvis?" He called.

_Yes, Rogers?_

Mari found it funny, how he cringed at the sound of the 'building's voice' and smiled up at him in silent amusement.

"Tell Stark it's just me going walking with the kid when he gets the entry-exit notice."

_I shall alert him now. Have a nice walk, sir._

Perhaps it was the accent that accompanied the dialogue but the machine seemed overly polite, like a servant, to where Steve wanted to correct it, to say it didn't have to use the 'sir' title... Goodness, he had been asleep for far too long.

Once out of the gawdy building (even if there was only a singlar _A_ adoring the building instead of the millionare's name), Rogers dropped to one knee. As he had done quite a few times before, he helped the young girl swing one of her legs around her neck, similar to how one would step off of a block to mount a horse. With the girl safely on his shoulders, his hands at her ankles and her own on his head, he started down the freshly dried sidewalk. Little damage was leftover from that fateful day, save for the occasional building he encountered that had been owned by a different company or group before the Chitauri attack.

A few blocks down the road, with the sight of Stark tower gone from his view but the shadow still remaining, he got the feeling of being watched. At the same time, Mari shuffled up on his shoulders. A quick glance up showed that she was looking around, her eyes darting across the scenery with obvious purpose. Rogers gave a small smile as he returned his gaze in front of him, tilting his head to respond to greetings he recieved on the street. There was no doubt what this feeling was, what Mari had been looking for- and found, based on her grin before she returned to a more balanced position.

_One of the others is always on the lookout for her. Good._

Chuckling, Steve was glad he had the idea for this walk. The girl needed to be reminded that she wasn't alone, that she was well looked after.

To the public (who did not recognize him due to his mask being off and the seventy years it had been since his shows), him and Mari may have looked like a father-daughter pair out for an afternoon on the town. Well, he felt like an uncle to the girl; close enough. He stuck to the streets, staying on the sidewalk and peering in the windows. Mari didn't complain about not going into the stores and cafes. Instead, she chattered like any other child her age, pointing out whatever she thought was of interest (which could be, quite literally,_ anything_).  
Up on his shoulders, the girl was always livlier than she was before. _Unafraid of heights_, Steve supposed. Natrual, given she had grown up in that tower. (Or, if that rumor was true, perhaps her love of heights came from elsewhere...)

Once he walked out as far as he planned to go he put Mari down on the concrete so she could walk the way back. A smart girl, she remained close and on his left side, away from the road and the cars (even though most were stopped due to perpetual traffic).

Not only was the walk good for _Mari_, it was a great stress relief to _him_ to be walking, experiencing, listening to her, to the many tangents.

"Tony always goes to that place, I recognize the restaurant label from the bags he brings home. How do you even say that? Schwarma?"

"Audi, Mazda, Ford, Chevy, Ford, Toyota, Chevy, Dodge- I like those, they have rams on them!"

"Oh, that car has a football helmet on the back! Which team, which team?"

"That's a sparrow... a finch? A sparrow. Gotta be a sparrow!"

"Was that guy wearing a _purple _suit?"

"Hey, there's a dog!"

Steve's heart stopped at the sight of Mari bolting from his side toward a restaurant, where a dog sat tied to a telephone pole, probably waiting for the owner ordering their fare inside. It was some sort of mutt, a dusty brown color with a curly tail and sighthound like ears. Obviously a pet, the dog was well rounded, possibly fed too much and then table scraps on top of that. It could have been the most gentle creature in the world for all he knew. Then again, the dog could be dangerous to children.

Like the child running toward it.

"Mari-!"

"Is okay, he's friendly!"

Steve ran a hand through his hair, sighing roughly- both at the girl, who seemed to have no idea how her actions affected him, and at the amused glances other patrons were giving them. Standing but a few paces away, Rogers let the girl have her time with the dog. She was sitting on the ground, facing the mutt, one hand on its collar to hold it back while the other rubbed from the space in between the dogs eyes down to his nose.

Ah, dogs. He had fond memories of them, himself. For the same reason he had been chosen for the serum which made him who he was, dogs were selfless. They loved for the sake of loving and guarded for the sake of saving others. Eager to learn, they trusted before they hated, easy to please, there was almost nothing negative he could come up with, save for the occasional, more violent beasts that tainted their images. (Had he not been worrying just a few moments before?)

Clicking his tongue, Steve approached the dusty colored dog. The creature tilted its head at first. Soon, the mutt opened its mouth in a grin that sent its tongue lolling over the side of its gums as Steve stroked the opposite side of the dog's face.

It sparked an idea, that little meeting with the dog; with his hand guiding Mari away, with her hearty calls back to the creature still ringing in his ears, he easily shook off the rather confused and startled look the next day when he acted on that idea.

"...where'd you get that thing?"

"The pound, of course. A rescue."

"Why on Earth do you have a dog?"

The dark sable Shepherd mix (for no purebred would ever have floppy ears) slept soundly on Steve's personal couch. If he had been the more gruff, personal type of man he may have sneered in reponse and asked why it mattered what he did on _his_ floor of the Stark tower. No, that was unlike him in too many ways to count. Instead, he put on that friendly smile that was second nature to him now. "Fury said... it would be good to find things I enjoy, to make life easier, lighter, less of a shock to me."

"Ah... so you think that little guy's going to help?"

"I throw the ball, he brings it back. He's not going to contemplate its trajectory and potential energy aloud."

Judging by the way the light in his eyes changed, the explanation made sense. Obviously on his way to one of the upper floors meant for training - for the underground was owned by the Iron Man suits, lab and cars - Barton shrugged his shoulders to readjust his quiver.

With the man walking away, Steve said to himself;

"Mari also loved the idea. I think the dog would be a good friend for her."

Perhaps he planned to give the dog to the girl as a gift, a shared pet, trained to guard its masters while not being so aggressive that it became a nuisance. In other words, the right... no, the _perfect_ partner.

* * *

There may be those of you who wonder why I chose to name the girl _Mariposa_ over something more imposing. There is a reason; the name means _butterfly_ and was chosen to reference _the butterfly effect_ chaos theory (the popular example of the theory being that "a butterfly flapping its wings could cause a hurricane weeks later").

Yes, to those of you who actually got to read the comics; the "purple" jab was a shot at canon Hawkeye.


	3. Legacy

I had planned to submit this yesterday but a surprise road trip changed that~  
Good thing, too, it gave me some time to think about the next two chapters. The final two will be sequential; the first three here haven't been sequential but have all referenced each other. That's how I prefer my writing, loose yet connected. :)

The title of this one may not make sense/as much of an impact if you haven't seen the _Iron Man_ movies.

* * *

**" Legacy "**

_In order for the weapon to be effective, Agent Barton is right, sir- you will need to move it closer to the wrist. The human arm sways due to breathing and heartbeat. Where it is now will impede aim._

"Not to mention Legolas could lose his thumb on a bad day."

There was no reply. Dammit, the man just couldn't play along, could he? (Or, he never did when Stark actually _wished_ it. Bastard. Two could play at that game. Perhaps he could make this lovely new concept weapon a bright pink or purple. Who would be laughing then?) Brushing off the imagined slight, Stark took the specialized tablet pen that he had custom created to work with his holographic simulators. Using a process near identical to that which he had perfected (and continued to work on) the suits, he had varying levels of what would become a wrist weapon currently surrounding Hawkboy's right arm. (His right arm, for his left always held the bow, which could double as a desperate club.) There was that pesky fact of a quiver being able to hold only so many arrows; another _actual _weapon would be handy to have once the quiver held nothing more than air.

Over the years, the archer had denied almost all of Stark's ideas. The man was just too low key! What was the harm in a little flair here and there? An electric weapon had been designed at first, a clear shot at the archer since it was known Widow wore one of her own.

Instead of Hawkboy, that weapon ended up on Rodgers, as a last resort.

Next was a sort of grappling gun, one that could be used instead of those custom arrowheads of his that did the same thing, that had saved him that day in Manhattan. Stark felt himself clever coming up with that. With a grappler on his wrist, surely that would leave more room for those incendiary arrowheads that were just so damn handy? (Not to mention he wanted to know so badly how those worked. Damn Fury for having that design _on paper_ and, thus, out of reach of his hacking probes.)

No. Hawkboy hadn't taken that one, either. Widow had ended up with it. _More like walked out of the room with it, claiming that her own grappler had been broken by Stark somehow. ..._which may or may not have been true. He pleaded the fifth on that one.

Third had been a miniaturized bazooka, one that fired one of those "ex-wife" missiles Hammer tech had tried to sell off. Only, because it was _Stark_ technology and not _Hammer_, it actually worked. (Badass. That's the only word that fit. Absolutely _badass_.) Minimal kick, too, due to a strap system that wrapped around the wrist like a glove and extended up the arm like a flexible cast ; but _no_, 'the archer' couldn't have his arm impeeded at all, wouldn't even work with it to make the material flex a bit, to loosen to a more comfortable level. That design was sold to SHIELD (with the knowledge that SHIELD wouldn't let it get to the world's militaries), giving him a handsome return in patents and royalties. Hey, he had to pay for those lights, holograms and Schwarma _somehow._

So. On to try number four-

-and there the man was, pulling his arm out of the hologram while shaking his head.

"I'm good."

"Oh come _on_. You need _something _secondary-"

"I have a pistol, Stark. I run out of arrows, I'll use that."

"I thought we already had one of Charlie's angels?"

Once again, no response. With his arm back by his side, the archer was shaking it as if casting off water. (Most people seemed to do that after coming 'in contact' with the holograms. Really, was it just him or was there nothing wrong with the display?)

Tapping his foot once in annoyance at yet another defeat, Stark used the pen to pull the new weapon's design back with him to the main station, where he left it hovering over the white table as if hanging on the rack. Returning to the other side of the desk, where the four computer monitors glowed with the photos of his refurbished project cars, he turned off the screen savers. There was an orange security warning up on the top right of one of the screens, one that had hovered there for the past... however long it had been.

Rolling his eyes, the eccentric man turned on his feet, his arms wide as if he was ready to address the world. There were a few rafters still exposed to make lower garage/lab level feel a bit larger than it already was. Casting his eyes up, he called; "Alright Katniss, come down from the tree. The other Tributes have gone."

_Her name is Mariposa, sir..._

"Jarvis." Stark said, his brows raised in all of their sarcastic glory even though it was his own machine. "_I know_. It's a joke. I'm kidding with her."

_My apologies, sir._

"...but you can't see me."

"Kid, I don't _need_ to see you." Turning back to his computers, Stark waved one hand over his shoulder, the universal _come here, follow me_ gesture. Maybe it would beckon her down to the ground, maybe it wouldn't. Either way, it meant no difference to him. He rather liked an audience while he worked. "I've got pressure plates on every surface of this place that's large enough for someone's big toe, even one as small as yours. Doesn't matter the time of day, I always know where you are. I've known you were there- have been since I started work on that concept."

Stark sent a sideways glance into one of his cars that sat parked in a line on the other side of the lab. His mouth twitched down in a frown as he approached the more expensive of them. "That, and, your fleabag has been shedding on the interior of the Audi for the past hour. C'mon, get!" At the command, the Shepherd mix jumped over the opposite car door and jogged away. "Do you carry one of those lint rollers or something? If you do, don't hand it to me. I hate being handed things."

"If I did have one, could I throw it at you instead?"

Stark had the tablet pen back in his hand and pointed at the girl who had come down from her hiding place and taken a seat in _his_ work chair. "See? You see that?" Stark made his voice louder than it had to be. "That's the sort of thing I worry about. You're getting bad ideas from the others. They're bad influences, Mary-"

"Mari-"

"The very _idea_ of throwing something at me. Who have you been talking to? Rodgers and his boomerang of death?" None of that had been too serious, of course. The girl, perhaps around ten (he was never good with birthdays), was laughing.

Hmm. Perhaps idea number four wouldn't have to go to waste. Tapping the pen to turn it back on, he warped the concept weapon, shrinking it down while murmuring commands to Jarvis to alter inner workings to accomodate the smaller size. Stark waved his hand to summon the girl again. His hands worked fast and his mind faster. "Come here, I've got an idea."

At the top of the stairs, Stark heard Barton's footsteps stop. The man's voice just barely made it through the glass that surrounded the lab. "Stark?"

"C'mon, c'mon," Tony encouraged the girl while he ignored the man calling his name. He stepped back from the main white worktable, the tablet pen dragging along the concept hologram.

"What is that?" The girl asked as she approached, her hands clasped together behind her back. A perfect picture of innocence but he knew better than to believe those bright eyes or that ponytail. There was potential there; true potential.

"This, Mary-"

"Ma_r_i."

"-this is one of many, many projects. Smaller things take the monotony out of the day." He turned the holographic weapon in a full circle and brought it down to Mari's level. "See this here? It's a miniaturized crossbow." Simplicity would be best since he was talking to a child. "The bolts are stored here, though more could be held in a pouch higher up on the arm, hip or leg. It seems cumbersome at first, though being just a foot wide and having bolts powered by more than a string is certainly better than an incredibly heavy piece of machinery that could be near as tall as you. The bow itself is collapsable-" Which a swipe of the tablet pen, he demonstrated so. "-and, though that wrist will be a bit heavy, that isn't anything that wearing an equivalent weight on the opposite wrist could compensate for. That, and, it could be a good thing to slam into an enemy's head or side if they get too close."

"_Stark_?" Came the archer's voice from the stairwell, barely any stronger.

"So do I slip my hand in here? ...can I even touch it?

"It's perfectly safe. Dip your hand in and wait for the glove and shoulder strap to register you. There, there, good- now, move your arm around-"

"_Stark._"

Tony turned to glimpse over his shoulder. Barton had not put in the security code and opened the door to the lab yet again but there he stood just outside the glass, staring in with those green-gray eyes. Was he displeased? Did it matter? "No, no, walk away now," Stark quite obviously chided, his tone more mocking than before. "This isn't your toy anymore."

Stark brought a hand up to his forehead when the archer did a doubletake. "The _weapon_, not the girl. Honestly, she's _far _too young for me-" The girl laughed from beside him. "-and not even my type. I prefer them with a bit more... Y'know. Pepper."

Goodness, the archer's gaze was unyielding. Stark returned the staredown but to no use; leaving the girl to turn over her arm repeatedly to get a good look at the hologram, Stark relented and exited the lab so he was also standing at the bottom of his own stairs.

"Why are you desigining her a weapon?"

"Remember, this was meant for _you_ at the start."

"Why are you giving it to her?"

The tone of voice said it all. Like his partner, Barton didn't have to raise his voice to convey emotion, intention. The man wasn't happy, no where near. He may have been genuinely furious or insulted for all Stark knew but that wasn't important to the designer right then. Sending a glance back in through the glass, he dropped the volume of his voice just in case the girl would wander in any closer;

"I'd be a fool not to, Barton. Look at the girl. Look at where she is, who she is with, _who she was just with_- Of all of us who occasionally frequent these halls, I am the public face. I am Iron Man. My name is out there; why do you think I try my damned hardest _not_ to be seen with her? Let the Cap walk with her her, or Banner; they are unimposing, quiet people, easy to forget. You stand on rooftops during those walks and keep watch; I know, I've seen you during the flight tests I've done on the Mark 8.

"Her being associated with us has put a target right between her eyes. Eventually someone will come and she will need to be ready. She needs firepower of some sort; you didn't take this prototype. Why not give it to her?"

The archer's eyes were unreadable, some sort of mixture of fading anger and deep thought along with something the designer couldn't place; or, perhaps Stark had lost interest by then.

Clenching the tablet pen tight, he finished; "_This. _This kid, not news footage, is our legacy, Legolas. Be glad I'm going to keep her safe."

Turning on his heels, he entered the security code from muscle memory. It took until he was back in the work zone and guiding the girl toward the computers for Barton to start up the stairs again, a trip that Stark didn't interrupt.

"What did you guys talk about?" Mari mused. She put her hands on the computer table and hauled herself up just as the hologram faded from her arm. (She also shook her hand like it had been dipped in water- why did people do that?) That dog of hers finally decided to slink out of whatever hiding hole he had found and took a seat next to the desk. Stark eyed the Shepherd mix as if daring it to knock over the tool rack to its left.

"See this blueprint, kid? The machines over there are going to make it. By tomorrow I'll be teaching you how to aim."


	4. Twice

I am so glad to have finally gotten here.  
Let me address a couple things I've seen in reviews and other messages; I really haven't meant for it to seem like poor Mari is abandoned or estranged. The girl isn't- that was just the mood for poor Rogers' chapter, mimicking how lost he feels. That's why he has a bit of connection with the girl, he doesn't want her to feel the same way. I won't go into a deep explanation about how I just hadn't "gotten around" to showing how Clint and Tasha feel about the girl... Instead, I'll say this; this is Clint's chapter. This is his chance to start and shine. (I want to write more with him and Mari, specifically. Father/Daughter dynamics fascinate me.)  
Every other chapter had the assassin duo in it as little as possible on purpose; one, I wanted people to anticipate this. Two, it wasn't their parts. It was Banner's, Rogers', Stark's. Now it's their turn.  
That's the problem with Fanfiction, I suppose. Unlike a book or a movie, where you have the completed product in your hands, you have to wait.  
I've worked my fingers off the past two days with this part and Natasha's. Both are over 4,000 words long, this part here nearing 5,000. I'm sorry it's taken so long. I didn't mean for it to; I blame a year's worth of doctor appointments in a week, two days which were spent recovering from heavy side effects from some medicine.

The title was the hardest part. Every other title in this mini-series has/will play off a line the character said _or_ a theme that applied to them in _Avengers_/their own movies. For Barton... due to his lack of lines and non-Loki-influenced screentime, I'm going off of a theme that showed up while I was writing this.

Hopefully all that made sense. I ain't mad at anyone, no worries. I don't take things to heart- the compliments are taken with a smile and criticism is taken into consideration. Thank you all, all of you who took time to review :)

* * *

**" Twice "**

"It's like Manhattan all over again, 'eh?"

"Less talking, Stark!"

Of course Stark would have heard that exhange between himself and Natasha during that hellish fight due to those communicators (which had come so freaking in handy). No doubt the "Iron Man" still wondered what exactly had happened at (fucking) Budapest and the jab was a not-so-friendly reminder. Well, he could certainly do _without_ childish inside jokes when there was a pistol being loaded at the same time he was reaching for an arrow. The person (man, woman, didn't matter) in the black military armor had a new clip in the 9mm but not before _he_ had an arrow notched and released. There was nothing flashy about the arrowhead he'd chosen; no firepower, no explosives, no electronics. It was a serrated hunting tip that tore through his target's neck, pure, primal and simple. Not the quickest of deaths but he wasn't too worried about that. What was a little more blood on his hands so long as it wasn't his own?

The precussive shockwave of the Iron Man suit's thrusters slammed into his back, a sensation that had taken a while of getting used to. (At least it wasn't pointed at him; he felt sorry for the poor bastard who was getting the brunt of that attack.) Doubling over, he adjusted his weight so that the thick soles, the heels of his boots dug into the leaf litter. Like a hurricane force wind (which he had stood in before, not his smartest day), it was a solid wall of air that hit him like a ton of bricks; unlike a hurricane, it wasn't constant. It came, it went, there was no storm to fuel another fire. Looking over his shoulder, Barton saw a hole in the foliage and two trees coming down; the pines took out two snipers that had been hiding in their upper branches. Well, would you look at that; he'd planned to take them out next but a little help never hurt. One of the snipers moved on the ground; an arrow flew from his bow before his mind registered the action; the sniper moved no more.

The quiver was running low. Under the cover of dust and debris from the falling trees, Barton dashed forward, toward the two that were felled by those trees. A lightning fast search saw smaller pistols on their persons, in satchels on their chests. (They were snipers, of course a pistol wouldn't have been drawn.) Barton had both guns secured.

One of the two was still alive. The moment he felt a hand around his ankle, Barton drew his freshly acquired gun and fired three rounds. _Let go of me- you're supposed to be dead- this will make damn sure of it!_

"How long?" He called into the earpiece. While not as numerous as before, the new wave of the enemy was smarter, sticking to the undergrowth instead of running out to fight head on like bulls ready for slaughter. Still, his hearing was keen; one snapped twig later and there was a hole in their heart. Though dual wielding wasn't near as accurate as pulling the Weaver stance with one gun, he had twice the number of shots and his aim was pretty damn good to begin with. An inch or two here or there, it didn't matter so long as the target became unable to shoot back. That, and, where was he going to put the second gun? The snipers were trapped under trees, no way he could have grabbed an extra holister.

"Not too much more," Came the confident reply. Where was Stark? Not important. Sound came from behind- Barton turned, dropped the pistols and drew the bow in a single motion; quiver, switch, notch, shoot, blast- the incendiary tip took care of the target and flushed out two more. From above, the Mark 8 suit sent out those diminutive, deadly darts; target neutralized.

'_Target acquired_,' rang a new voice over the headset. (Ear communicator, whatever it was called.) Barton sent a look over his shoulder. As expected, the cycling sound of chopper blades swiftly approached until the SHIELD aircraft loomed overhead, casting the small clearing (if it could be called so) in shadows that rippled like water. Stark took to the air, hovering a respectful distance from the craft. The cargo bay at the back opened, a rope ladder was tossed out; Barton twisted part of the rope around one wrist for balance, and the ladder was hauled back into the chopper with smooth continuity that came only from a pump or crank, some sort of mechanical means. Once inside the ladder (and its pulley) was put back in storage by the co-pilot; he and the pilot himself were SHIELD personnel he wasn't familiar with. Though they couldn't be all that bad, not when they had a fresh set of his specialized arrows and tips waiting on a first-class tier seat.

'_Where exactly are we headed?'_ Came Stark's voice from the outside, muffled slightly by the chopper's blades echoing in the man's communicator.

The pilot in SHIELD gear turned to examine a map before replying. "Ten miles due east. The facility is in a ghost town across the river. The military pulled the plug on the neighborhood years ago; no one's touched those homes since. Not even SHIELD."

'_Hidden in plain sight.'_

"Look for a street that almost meanders- almost doubles back on itself. At the top of the curve there will be two broken billboards. To the left of the billboards, if you're looking at them from the meandering road, you'll see the house we're looking for."

'_Rodger that._'

_What was all of that about, Stark? Playing G.I. Joe in the jungle?_ Barton mused. In his ear, there was a sharp spike of negative feedback; Stark was possibly going supersonic. Excessive for a short ten mile trip but there was no arguing with a millionare in a weaponized suit. His eyes, sharpened by assignments, firefights and years of adrenaline, followed the chopper's path. Soon, shapes became apparent against the undergrowth; deer became deer, wolves were obvious wolves, and both men and military vehicle were as visible as neon lights on a starless night. Men, machines, weapons - most of which went up in Stark-colored flames soon after Barton saw them - all of which seemed to be coming from and headding in one directon; East. Just as the pilot had said.

_Ah_, the seemingly random drop into a forested area near suburban homes now made sense. _He wanted us to draw them out._

'_Hovering over the target. ETA?_'

"Thirty seconds."

'_Barton?_'

"Yes, Stark?" This was the private line, team member to team member, the chopper personnal excluded. Barton did little to that realization save for raising one brow.

'_Bring the biggest guns you got. None of that miniscule amount of explosive crap. I want whatever you used on the helicarrier._'

Despite himself, Barton straightened up, his hand hanging in mid air where it had been reaching for a composite arrow, his back at a _painfully_ proper posture. The memories from being under someone else's control weren't perfectly clear; there had been nothing wrong with his eyesight at the time, the memories were simply... hued. Hued a slight blue and blurred, not every detail coming back as clearly as he would like. It wasn't hard, though, to recall installing the arrowhead (_more like warhead..._), aiming out of the cargo bay of a stolen jet, adjusting due to the wind, watching as the arrow arced right and landed, its charge counting down, the fire, the smoke-

'_Barton_,' Stark responded, the word a bark, when all he got was silence. '_If you had it that day, you have it on you now. Don't give me any melodramatic guilt crap; you don't get a soliloquy. If that stuff did that much damage to one of SHIELD's turbines then it will do more than we need now._'

"What exactly is that? _What we need now?_" His mind was on his words, not his actions; his fingers were hitting the correct combination, selecting what he considered the most excessive of his arrowheads. Whether he abhored the damage they caused or not, sometimes bringing the building down around him was the only way to escape in one piece. With the warhead installed, he pulled the arrow from the quiver, doing his damned best not to look at the gleaming, silver machinery that promised to do all Stark needed and more.

The cargo bay door was opening. The chopper slowed its forward progress until it hovered over the two aforementioned billboards. Glancing down, the ads were long past being legible; black paint and lettering remained along with washed out colors and torn canvas, a sight more worthy of an emergency room patient than an advertising firm.

Sure enough, though there were no men in the area Barton could see a much trodden system of pathways extending around the home. A rather feeble attempt was done to hide the tracks; brushing dirt with a pushbroom or leaf would destroy fresh footprints on hard ground with loose dust but this ground wasn't solid; tire tracks had made premanent impressions into the soil, rendering any hope of plant growth impossible, like fossilized prints of the evil they promised.

"What's in that place, Stark?" His tone was low, serious. His mind was clear. In the zone, the mindset needed for extreme precision, there was no time to think of anything else.

'_Some of my own old hardware._'

"Stark Industries weapons? Last I checked, they weren't illegal."

'_These weren't exactly bought._'

"Distributed by that old partner of yours?"

'_Indirectly. These are ready to be transported out of the country. I'd rather not let that happen._'

His body was already aiming the arrow and its deadly payload, the motion coming from muscle memory alone. "You want them to go sky high."

'_That's the plan._'

Slow breaths. Regular heartbeat. A calm train of thought, one that came and went with grace instead of chaos. "Fury's put you up to this, hasn't he?" His shoulder shook once to adjust to the payload of a fully strung bow. "Making the circumstances fighteningly similar..." He allowed a heartbeat's pause to check his aim, something completely unecessary. Perhaps _he_ was the one stalling now. His fingers eased, the modern arrow slipped through his fingers, through the air. "...all to make sure that 'ol Hawkeye's alright."

'_What makes you say that?_'

"One, your sarcasm." The chopper gained altitude, as did the Mark 8. Barton held tongue, watching the scene below until the target home was reduced to a fireball and quickly ascenting plume of smoke. Banking right and shaking slightly from the shockwave, the chopper began its trip back to base. "Two, you love blowing shit to kingdom come. Particularly your own old weapons. Why else would you take back seat? Even then I feel like I'm making you into too much of a humanitarian."

'_I agreed with Fury for once. I know- shocking, isn't it? Maybe the world really will end this year._ _I doubt a bit of Mayan doomsday will be any worse than an alien invasion. Perhaps the New York media will blame us for that, too._'

_I wouldn't doubt it. _The composite bow was folded and placed back in its silver casing. The quiver was removed from around his shoulders and gracelessly discarded on the seat he'd found the arrows on before.

A wind he hadn't realized was there died down as the cargo door finally closed, the heavy clunking steps announcing Stark's presence inside the craft.

"No one blames you."

While the look Barton sent over his shoulder was casual and dismissive, his hardened gray eyes said _you've told me all this before._

"Sometimes we all need reminders."

If he was a more sentimental person the correct response would have been a breathless, murmured _thank you_, said with a straight posture that hinted at a mental revelation. Thoughts could not be revelations, however, if they had occured before. He knew what Stark was playing at; just as the helicarrier's blown turbine and the lost SHIELD agents were no fault of his own, Stark wasn't at fault for damage caused by those weapons being illegally obtained. Neither of them would fully accept the lack of guilt; an impasse, a sort of acceptance of their mutual lack of control over the situations. _You don't blame me, I won't blame you._

If anyone understood, it was Stark. He was alright. He _was_ alright. Talking about it would only keep the actions and guilt fresh in his mind; it was best to let it fade out of both his and the world's memory.

Stark walked up the aisle until he stood in between the pilot and co-pilot. The conversation, whatever it was about, was lost as Barton took the sideways facing seat next to the one his arrows were in. He allowed himself a bit of shut-eye during the half day trip ahead. Dark and dreamless, it was the perfect sort of rest, full and uninterrupted. Whether he was so sensitive that he could tell the chopper was landing or he just had hellishly good timing, he was blinking awake - once to clear his vision, twice to adjust to light, three times to get his bearings - as the engine died down, the blades ceased spinning.

Sometime during the trip back Stark had removed the "Iron Man" armor. The man with the glowing heart went down the exit stairs at his usual quick, business-man like pace, already snapping his fingers and assuming control of his own slice of the universe.

"Agent Barton."

Glancing to the right from the top of the stairs, he saw agent Hill standing in the shadow of the hangar. He nodded to acknowledge her. "Change frequencies in your communicator," The woman said. "You're needed for consultation."

_Fury_. There was no need to ask which frequency. With another nod of his head the woman was off, her steps purposeful. At the same time he reached a hand up to his ear, hit the coresponding switch, and waited to be addressed. (There were cameras at every angle, sensors at every corner; when he was online someone would know.)

"You need me, sir?" Inside the hangar, he went toward a set of lockers, retrieved a set of his own civilian clothes, proceeded to remove the armor he wore when on mission and slip on the polo and jeans.

'_In a word? Yes._'

"Talk to me." Sunglasses on, bow and arrows hidden in a larger silver case, he walked out of the building looking like nothing more than a man who enjoyed a day at a gun or archery range.

'_I need you t' find somethin' for me._'

"Something?"

'_More like someone. Two someones._'

"Stark would be better suited for this, with all the gizmos in that suit. Though I think he's taken off in that fancy jet of his, so you'll need to wait to speak with him unless you hack his systems."

'_He isn't as familiar with the folks I'm talkin' 'bout._'

"I assume that I am, then?" The door to the hangar was open. His car was waiting where it always was; back of the lot, far left. Same spot every time, any place he went.

'_You've found Agent Romanoff twice before. I need you to do it again._'

_Twice?_ The thought went in and out of his consciousness like a flash of light in the dark; there, visible, then gone as quick as it came. No time to dwell on it right then. "You said two someones." With his free hand Barton found his set of keys. Absentmindedly he tossed them and lashed a hand forward, roughly grabbing them out of the air before doing it all again, timing each toss and catch with his own footsteps.

'_It's an... odd set of circumstances._'

The honest befuddlement in Fury's voice brought Barton to a stop. Standing in between the front bumper of two cars, his own still several rows down and left, he was in no danger from oncoming traffic. His head tilted in genuine curiosity. Fury didn't know nearly as much as was liked about whatever this situation was; Barton had the sneaking suspicion he was being sent to find the answers.

Still no response. Walking once more, Barton threw out a bit of bait; "Hell if I know what Natasha's been up to. I see her for a year, she vanishes for two. She works, she goes off to wherever the hell she goes to- not really my job to keep track."

'_According to what I've got filed from near a year ago, she's on unannounced leave._'

"What, you saying she's on vacation or something?" Admittedly, he grinned as he said this. It wasn't hard to picture her packing her things and leaving Fury to guess where she was hiding.

'_Injury, illness and other reasons happen, Agent Barton. Now, if I'd seen nothing to support this claim I'd be more at ease. However, that's just it. We've seen _nothin'._ Nothin' to confirm, nothin to refute. Just a black hole of missing statements._'

"You're saying it looks fishy." Tapping the corresponding button, the car's doors unlocked. Opening the passenger's side he slipped the bow's caseing onto the floor.

'_And you know how I hate seafood._' A rookie may have laughed at what wasn't a joke; Barton merely closed the passenger door, walked around the back, and let himself in the driver's seat after a quick glance under both the vehicle and the hood to check for explosives or trackers. '_The two 'a you got a nack for findin' one another. Get me details, Barton, is all I ask- somethin' to write down to fill the void._'

"Who's the second target, sir?"

'_Banner. He shows up on the grid. Motives, however, are just as empty._'

Static; the conversation was over. (More importantly, that conversation never happened.)

...Twice.

Perhaps a plane trip across the country wasn't the best thing to do. He should have driven; at least then he would be forced to focus on the road day and night, giving his mind minimal chance to wander. Only then did Fury's line make sense. Yes, he had found her once under Fury's command, and let her live when the directive was to eliminate. The second time, now.

_And what did the Tesseract show you, Agent Barton?_

Unsure if he wanted to curse the demigod or SHIELD commander who decided to use that memory to his advantage, Barton simply kept his mouth shut and ignored thoughts of them both.

That was then, this was now. There was no hulking (horrible pun) metal monstrosity in the sky; rather, the commercial plane touched down on the mainland in North Carolina. A rental car and short trip north later, he was headed southeast.

Just as Fury said, Banner hadn't taken himself out of the general loop. A bit of searching, a few calls to old contacts both affiliated with SHIELD and not, and he was starting to build a pathway. The phrase "_Yeah, someone of those creditials worked with a few patients nearby_" became his best friend. Patient testimonials, confirmation that the doctor was the soft-spoken man Barton was looking for, became good drinking buddies.

Slowly but surely, a pattern began to emerge. It put a grin on his face to look at a map see so many red cirles so close by. Why was it such a thrill, because there was no general threat of injury or dismemberment occuring once the target was found? (So long as he wasn't a fool and didn't piss Banner off, he would be fine.) This was something sedate, simple; a break from the near "end of the world" extreme visibility and heroics, taking out contraband Stark weapons for a year and a half included.

Best of all, the place he was headed was familiar. Secluded. Unimposing.

He was headed to the Outer Banks.

Banner preferred areas where the economy wasn't as strong, where interest in needless alteration surgery was low and want for _true_ medical help was needed. While the chain of sandbar islands were no where near as bad off as where he had hidden before the entire Manhattan ordeal, it was pretty bad as compared to the rest of the continental US. The reports he was able to confirm as Banner had been on either the islands or mainland Carolinas. Six each in Corolla, Duck, Kitty Hawk and Hatteras, four in Kill Devil Hills and Pea Island, two in Ocracoke and six on the Carolinas' shores, including one in Hilton Head.

The way Fury had spoke hinted that the commander believed the two absences were related. If that was the case, then he was about to strike gold, (another horrible pun, considering the local Blackbeard legends. He was full of it today, wasn't he?) for he happened to know that Natasha had a home in Avon.

What a lovely place it was in its interior. Archetecture, craftsmanship, maker's marks, organization and other arts around the home weren't a strongsuit of his but one thing was clear; she used time and money and she damn well liked how it turned out. From what he could remember the thinner-than-wide, three floor home had everything in hues of browns, greens and blues, colors accented by sunlight and made pale, welcoming by sunset.

That was assuming it all looked the same.

A numeric address wasn't needed. Barton took the rental car down the single road - Highway 12 - that spanned every island and eyed the signs as they went by. Once on Avon he cast his eyes to the left; at the end of this island the construction (beach homes for the most part with the occasional convenience store) just _stopped_. Homes ended; the next sandbar island, the entirety of which was a nature reserve, began. Parking his car alongside the single road and staring farther down, there was nothing but sand in front, water to the visible left and right. It was as if civilization ended, that the end of the world had been found and a line drawn.

_Just how she would like it._

The end of the homes was in sight. Turning left down the last street, he parked alongside the road, as was customary in many neighborhoods. Stepping outside he turned, counted three homes away from the road and confirmed his thoughts when he saw a familiar shade of blue in the windows. It was comical, how odd it felt to be looking both ways while crossing a street. Across the road and touching a concrete driveway, Barton walked under the porch held up by wooden support beams meant to guard the lower levels from flood waters. Walking around to the right side of the home, he started up the stairs to the only door there was, save for a fire escape later on.

One step. Two. Three.

In unison with the wood creaking under his added weight, just inside the door came the sound of a gun's safety being removed. It wasn't hard to imagine the .45 being aimed at him through the door.

Without missing a beat he asked, "Is everything alright?"

"It could be more overcast." Came her deceptively calm voice from inside the door. "Yourself?"

"Damned long drive. Wish I had some music."

It wasn't exactly _code_ but a bit of banter that could give away so much if they deviated. The usual plesantry of "I'm fine" was never used. Its use meant that there was some sort of hostile nearby _or_ that whoever spoke had been taken in. (Kidnapped? No, no, that implied a lack of control over the situation. Neither of them was ever "kidnapped-" they were taken in for questioning and often left before they were welcome to.) Though that gripe about the weather was not as random as it seemed. Glancing over his shoulder Barton had to bring a hand up to shield his sunglasses; yes, it could be more overcast, the sunlight was _painful_.

The door unlocked while his back was still turned.

"Come on in."

He allowed himself inside once her footsteps went up the stairs. The lowest floor was made up of a stairwell and a storage area; there was nowhere else to go but up. Glad for the blue curtains being drawn to weaken the sunlight, he removed his sunglasses and windbreaker and draped them both across a pine table that remained where it had been during his previous visit. This floor, the second one, was a rather cozy living area, kitchen, living room and a place to eat, while the bedrooms were upstairs still. Little had changed since his last visit except he didn't see the person who owned the home.

Standing still, he could hear the very soft sound of shifting wood, meaning that Natasha was walking on the floor above. Had she been on the same floor her steps would have been absolutely silent, even if she had been right behind him. It was brilliant, how she could control the distribution of her weight to the point of it being an art.

Shrugging his shoulders to get rid of the bit of stiffness caused by the four hour drive (not too bad, he'd suffered through longer) he left the glasses and jacket on the table and meandered into the living area.

After half a year of taking out contraband weapons, the last instance being a carbon copy of a day he preferred to forget, it felt good to grin again.

It wasn't too odd a sight to occasionaly come across a SHIELD agent toting a child that wasn't theirs. (It would _almost_ explain the year-plus absense.) Often times dignitaries, embassadors and other government or worldly officials with obscure titles would enlist protection for their families. Should the American representative be going to an area where the relations were strained, often times the adults of the family and the children were guarded separately. They would gripe and groan, the parents would, but in those few instances where something _did_ happen they were on their knees giving SHIELD (and the agent) their many, groveling thanks.

"Well now," Barton mused with a chuckling tone he'd nearly forgotten he had. Kneeling down near the pale blue, three seater sofa, he put himself at eye level with a small girl. Doubtful that she could speak coherent words yet; she was small, barely holding herself upright without relying on the rear cushions. A pair of double-A batteries lay discarded on the far corner of a coffee table; the corresponding remote was on the sofa, in the girl's hands where she proceeded to gnaw on the corner. He tapped her head twice, gently. "Where'd they find you?"

Hazy colored eyes blinked up at him with a look common in young animals; curiosity mixed with recogniton with a touch of amazement. _Who is this new creature, why is he or she here, wow, there is more in this world than me?_

"You're in good hands, kid." Admittedly he tried and failed to stifle a yawn; it ended up warping his last two words. "Nat probably isn't coddling you like most women would- scratch that, she _definately_ isn't going to do that, but nothing's going to touch a brown hair on your head. Nothing insidious, anyway." Barton added on that last bit with another gentle tap which, juding by her smile, the girl rather liked. "Now, is there somehwere else I can put 'ya where you won't tumble over?" _Listen to me_, he wanted to say. _I might as well be talking to a cat._ "No offense but I'd like to sleep on that couch for a while. Perhaps put on a ballgame or something. Don't know who's playing, don't care. I'd need that remote, though."

"...Couch?"

"I figured that it was a better idea so that I don't get too acquainted with the bed."

"I can move her if you're so tired." Natasha's voice was quiet; she wasn't as close by as he thought. "Where were you stationed before you came out here?"

She didn't even question it. Either that or she knew someone would come knocking eventually. Perhaps it was both. "Too many places. California at the end."

"Where'd you land?"

"Raleigh."

"No closer?"

"You would have heard me coming."

Her only response was a slow blink; he wasn't quite sure what that meant, to be honest. Meanwhile, Natasha finally moved from where she had been standing by that pine table. Coming in to the living area, she put a phone down on that coffee table before taking the remote from the girl and putting it in the same placeS. (Barton spied the slight relief of a raised edge, hinting at a hidden compartment in a leg of the coffee table; ah, so that's where she had put the gun.) With a casual eye he watched Natasha's back as she walked off with the girl in hand. The girl had her head on Natasha's shoulder; she kept eye contact as they left, both her and Barton looking away only when Natasha stepped into the stairwell.

With a glance over his shoulder with caution that was second nature to him, Barton quickly put the television on the closest sports channel before reaching for the smartphone, using a knuckle to sort through the screens so he left no fingerprints behind.

_Sorry, 'tash, I'm here for some answers._

* * *

**_[Before you review and say I didn't make much headway or didn't have the interaction you liked, lookie there at the "next chapter" button- 'Tasha's part is up, too. These are sequential; Barton's part starts an event, 'Tasha's will end it.]_**


	5. Debt

Why, yes. I did just submit two long-ass chapters in one day.

After all that trouble Barton gave me, this part was a cakewalk. I've been toying with Natasha's personality quite a bit lately, as anyone who read my other fanfiction _5AM_ knows. I'm going for a more sedate Natasha in here- less dark than she was in _5AM_ and its sister chapter, _Midnight_. Same goes for the Clint/Natasha overall relationship.  
Big thanks to a good friend of mine, who we'll just call Kiki, whose talks with me about Natasha and Mariposa made it easier for me to figure out what kind of mother/daughter dynamic they will have. Hopefully this will fill your need for Assassins spazzing, Ki, until our favorite artist updates.

Last but not least- surprise, surprise! _This is no longer considered the last chapter. __There will be more. _After all, don't y'all want to know what Mari will do with that crossbow and dog?

* * *

**" Debt "**

The monotonous life of the average person threatened to drive her mad. Blackmail, insurrection, revolution, assassination, where was any of the old action, the rush, _the purpose_? What use was walking a home, cleaning the home, surfing television channels, looking at mindless internet garbage or whatever else she forced herself to concentrate on? For once she wasn't as fond of the paychecks she had accumuulated over her not too short, not too long life- all of that hidden sustenance waiting to support her meant that a job wasn't neccessary, was _suicidal_.

_Not all purpose is stamped in red ink with an approved, success or failure notice_, Banner had told her. So many times, they had talked over the past year- almost too many times. Those conversations became part of a pattern and patterns were not something she liked unless they had to deal with an enemy. Patterns meant repitition which meant predictability which meant weakness. She saw patterns in her enemies, used them to her advantage. She did her damned hardest to stray from any sort of continuity, to cover her tracks and vanish, essentially, into a cloud of smoke. At least Banner humored her by changing the constant face-to-face consultations into phone calls, texts, e-mails; the use of different media helped, if only by allowing her to walk without _all_ of her weight on her toes.

...heh. Was she wishing so strongly for some sort of surprise that she thought that a job would be a good idea? No, no. It was a terrible one. A job of any sort meant not only continuity but _visibilty_. SHIELD and its enemies had eyes, ears, cameras and whatever else they used to monitor the world and everything in it- someone would see, find out, _know_. Feeling a little less stir crazy wasn't worth potentially exposing herself. _Well_, she had mused with a chuckle on one of her darker days. _I can't feel fidgety if I'm dead._

However, she rather liked living. Why not keep it that way?

At least the weather wasn't as stagnant. Sun, humidity, wind, storms, Natasha swore she saw an example of every weather pattern known to man during the year. Spring was full of late frost and sudden warmth; summer was characterized by thunderstorms racking the windows and heat obscuring her vision; with fall came hurricaines that had her and Banner more than once on the Carolina mainland to wait out the storm; winter was gentle, a consistent cold accompanied by a rare flurry that never kept the ground covered for long.

Fall was preferred if only for the storms, the wind that created new noises, new emergency reports, new debris and served as a new sight to see outside the windows, which may have been better had they been paintings of the scenery.

Once more she had to think; how did normal folk survive that way?

The sight of a few new cars pulling in and out of the paifully familiar road had her curiosity peaked. (Perhaps she was growing desperate.) They were the flock of summer vacationers coming into the island now that summer had come again. The hurricanes having a late start this year may have helped. Some cars left as spring vacationers returned north or south, from wherever they came, and more cars came in as family members or friends found the homes where they would stay. Some cars were simple, some were horrendously lavish, some were right off the showroom and others custom built, maintained. Slowly but surely, they too became another thread of the monotonous fabric that had become her daily life. Perhaps if she understood more about String Theory she could create an elaborate extended metaphor with the thread, fabric, universe idea... it just wasn't worth asking Banner for the explanation. (_No way_ was she going to call up Stark to get a crash course unless that course ended with his head crashing through the table. Though, the more she thought about it the more that seemed like a _wonderful_ way to relieve stress.)

By the second week of the vacationer season the cars bored her and were as easily forgotten as the sound of the planes flying overhead.

...well. There _was_ the girl. It was a strange sort of second- no, third nature. All of those insanity driven thoughts came from the lack of external stimuli. Yet none of them were because of the girl. Or, as some women would say "her girl." However that just seemed like she was thinking of a pet, not a... kid. It was strange, as if she had some sort of second consciousness that was brought forward, that was now pacing like a tiger in a cage far too small. (Some days that was exactly how she felt.) While she stared outside, wishing for clouds to deaden the sunlight and wind to cool her down, she could be holding the girl, her free hand making comforting motions on the girl's back or scalp. They were automatic, driven by some force that really hadn't shown up before. The girl wasn't a distraction or hindrance, nothing that would seem out of place during daily life. Nor was the girl another pattern that Natasha begged to be rid of.

There were no words to explain it.

Mushy? Soft? No, she was neither. She didn't coddle or spoil or anything of the sort. Her care was silent, not filled with that foolish "baby talk"... and, if anything, the girl seemed to prefer it that way.

The third inning of a Nationals ballgame (that the two of them had been half watching, Natasha on her back with the girl sprawled on her stomach) was set on mute when she heard footsteps coming up the concrete. _Her_ concrete.

Children relied on the last shreds of human instinct that hadn't yet been evolved away; sensing the sudden tension, the girl turned to look at her mother. At once Natasha sat up before moving more carefully, slowly, putting the girl down on the sofa before moving to stand. Knowing she wouldn't understand the words themselves yet the intention would be clear, Natasha had murmured, "Stay still. Stay here," while putting a gentle yet firm hand on the girl's tiny shoulder. Ensuring the girl was still staring above the couch, searching for whatever it was that caused the change in atmosphere, Natasha grabbed for a gun she had stored in a slot on the coffee table. (There was another one hidden closer to the front door; she went for that particular one so she would have a gun the entire way down.) Closing the compartment she slowly circled the couch, started down the stairs, and approached the door, all the while keeping her eyes forward, her barefoot pace at a slow, lioness like gait.

The steps transitioned from concrete to the wood of the front stairs. One step, two, three-

She made a show of the sound from removing the safety, ensuring a fresh clip was loaded, and aiming through the door in the general direction of the stairs.

"Is everything alright?"

_Barton_. Still, she did not ease, not yet. "It could be more overcast." She murmured in casual response, finger still on the trigger, feet still spread in a balanced Weaver stance. "Yourself?" The answer would be most telling; why was he here? There wasn't another gun pressed into his back and waiting to change its aim to her, was there?

"Damned long drive. Wish I had some music."

Something small, insignificant. Yes, it was safe. He would have strung a story about "wanting to see her" if he'd been at gun, knife or the point of another weapon. To which she would have purred some sort of reply, hinting at him to drop down while she opened fire.

There was no need for her to fire through the door, not then. Exhaling a silent breath she leaned forward to unlock the door. "Come on in." After that she turned, jogging up the stairs with that silent gait she perfected over the years so she could put the .45 back in its hiding place. Before the girl could commit the hidden flap to her nonexistent memory Natasha ensured the batteries were out of the remote before handing it to the girl; kids liked to play with remotes, didn't they?

The remote out of her hands and into the girl's tinier ones, Natasha grabbed her phone from the corner of the coffee table and momentarially retreated to the third floor, where two bedrooms (one hers and the other never used) dominated the space.

At once she had the contacts open and shot a message off to Banner, who was supposed to be somewhere near Charlotte.

'_What the hell is Barton doing here?'_

'_Barton?'_ The repy came a moment or two later- the man's eyesight made it difficult for him to stare a texts for too long. Well, too bad for him, she didn't feel like talking, not with another assassin of her caliber (who was plenty capable of eavesdropping) meandering the floor below.

'_Yes. Barton.'_

'_This is nothing of my doing- he doesn't keep in contact with the rest of us like Stark does. Stark tries to keep up with us all, even you.'_

_ 'You think Clint was sent here?'_

_ 'I wouldn't doubt it, Natasha. SHIELD's probably getting antsy when it comes to you. Why is that a problem?'_

Admittedly, it was her next reply which was the slow one. '_You know what I mean.'_

_ 'What did I tell you at the start of this, Natasha?'_

Damned if she couldn't _hear_ his voice scolding her through the black, electronic words. '_That he would learn eventually, that "they all do."'_

_ 'Well. Perhaps "eventually" is now. Give Mari a hug for me while you're at it_. _She's a good kid.'_

'_It's Mariposa.'_

_ 'You know what I mean.'_

...Damn that man. Damn him for being like the charmer that soothed both the lion and made the beast cater to his every whim. She loved to play the charmer; she hated to be the lion. In Banner's hands, at his words, she was a goddamned _pussycat_. (She couldn't fight it, literally or metaphorically. They both knew who would win.) Seeing as she couldn't slam a smartphone shut she had to settle for closing the message and locking the phone, as if that would help keep the lion tamer's words at bay.

"Now, is there somehwere else I can put 'ya where you won't tumble over?"

Tilting her head, Natasha paused by the stairs, Barton's voice having pulled her out of her own thoughts.

"No offense but I'd like to sleep on that couch for a while. Perhaps put on a ballgame or something. Don't know who's playing, don't care. I'd need that remote, though."

She replied before the thought processed. "...Couch?"

From where Barton knelt on the floor in front of the couch, he looked up and over at her. "I figured that it was a better idea so that I don't get too acquainted with the bed."

_He doesn't plan to stay for long._ More and more this had the scent of a SHIELD fueled visit. Not that she had anything against the program but she owed them a little too much to be comfortable with. Though saving the island of Manhattan should have been more than enough to pay for her own life being spared, she credited that to Barton. Not SHIELD. Still yet, they did not override the archer's decision and take her out on their own. That meant something. She hated debts. She wanted to be even.

"I can move her if you're so tired." Natasha murmured, meaning for it to be a shot at the man's stamina. Barton didn't catch the jab; His eyes had drifted back down, back toward the girl. _I wonder if Mari somehow knows_, she thought, _or if he's just that disarming._ Perhaps it was a mix of both. To throw attention away from her silence she asked, "Where were you stationed before you came out here?"

"Too many places. California at the end."

"Where'd you land?"

"Raleigh."

"No closer?"

"You would have heard me coming."

She raised her brows slightly in response. Honestly, she should have "heard" him coming long before that rental car pulled onto the road, long before his feet touched the wood of the stairs; she should have been keeping tabs on his progress, his movement, seen that SHIELD may have changed his path. Her fault would not be mentioned if he did not realize it happened. If he thought she would have seen him and run, let him. Rolling her shoulders in an impromptu stretch, Natasha moved from where she had knelt by the light pine table and crossed the room. Putting both the phone and remote on the coffee table she took the girl, Mari, into her arms. It was fascinating every time; her conscious mind focused on the other assassin in the same room, on the bird's shadow that just went by the window, on the sound of a car rocketing by on Highway 12, on the Nationals ballgame that was on the television once again... It wasn't muslce memory but some sort of primal drive; she did not _have_ to think about the way she handled, cared for the girl. That may have been why life with Mari was so easy to accept, to adapt to.

The girl only looked ahead when they were near the top of the stairs. In the doorway to the bedroom that was used Natasha looked down at Mari. Eyes, like words, were an easy read; it was the interpretation of both that could lead to problems. The girl was confused; she leaned to the side as far as her young mind would allow without fear of falling over, glanced up at her mother, and repeated the two motions again.

She may have been simply curious. How many different people came into this home? Banner, herself, the occasional UPS delivery driver that saved her from days of sick boredom by bringing whatever she ordered, so few that Natsha didn't need a full hand to count them, let alone her toes. On the other hand there were those childhood instincts, those strong little tidbits that were all that stood between an infant being human instead of a mindless bag of bones. Perhaps something in her chemistry recognized the man downstairs even if she was not told why.

"Give me a moment," Natasha murmured as she stepped into the bedroom, placed the girl down on the navy blue carpet, walked back into the hall and closed the door behind her. The bedroom was safe, she had made sure of it on days where a run across the dunes had been a necessity. (The injured ankle she had gotten from that had certainly distracted her. The master assassin, trapped indoors by a bum ankle. It hurt more when adrenaline wasn't surging through her veins like a strong drink. Though those helped, too.)

How a drink sounded good right then. She had come down the stairs with her weight on her toes, had planned to make a grab for the first thing she saw that was not alcohol when she saw that Barton had not layed down. He was sitting up, leaning over, the muscle in his right shoulder twitching in a way that hinted at movement lower in the extremity...

Narrowing her eyes, Natasha retreated one, two, three steps back into the stairwell. For a moment she was silent to listen the noise from the ballgame. Sure she was out of sight, she called, "What's the score?"

"Mm?"

"I was watching that before you got here." She came down a step and focused on forcing her foot to make a sound. "Inning, score, pitch count, outs?"

"Fifth inning, I think-"

_Liar._ The dialogue from the announcing duo had said it was the bottom of the third just a moment before. Instead of voicing her thoughts Natasha decended the final stair and started toward the room with the television. A glance at the screen from the edge of the room showed she was right; bottom of the third, two men on base, no outs.

"My bad, the third."

He was pulling the exhausted card; she recognized the way he slurred his voice, dropping it in octave and volume, giving it a lazy, early-morning feel. At the same time he had turned his head, glancing back at her from over the couch. Routine, protocol- he was pulling this act because he normally would have. Any other client probably would not have cared about the ballgame, not cared that he had mistaken the fifth for the third inning, brushing it off as the numbers "five" and "three" being very similar in some fonts. Not her. No. Her blue eyes met his stormy grey, met a challenge that only he could return. This was different than the acceptance of Banner's opinion. As much as she wanted to go her own way, she knew better than to ignore someone who clearly knew better. Her own well being was not the only thing at stake, no anymore.

This was not a battle of who knew better; this was a battle of equals. Strength, wit, skill, agility, will to live- she had only won on that day in the hellicarrier because she had a lucky break, because she happened to bring him down off of his feet and into the guard rail. Had that rail not been there he would have taken her feet from under her (for that's what she would have done) and the fight would have ended in a much darker, bloodier fashion.

If he was pulling this act then he was _sent_ here. _Sent_. At the same time he had turned, stared her in the eyes, and told her what he was doing.

"What is it?" She asked, not bothering to specify what she wanted to know, for there was too much to ever possibly narrow down.

"They say you've been on unnanounced leave. They have no time frame."

"They?" She was by the couch now, sitting on its arm; the eye contact never wavered.

"_They_ want answers to write in their journals."

"What about you?"

"_I_ want to know about whatever the hell has been going on." The archer looked away at last so he could find the smartphone and pull it in front of him. "I came here to humor Fury at first. Figured it was a good way to get away from Stark."

"When did that change?"

The man tapped the smartphone, bringing the menu screen back up.

"I don't understand. The banter between you. And Banner. It's the sort of talk that occurs between two parties that share information where one is reluctant to say it by name. And that name is, apparently, Mari." His gray-green eyes threatened to bore holes through hers. "Is that the girl's name?"

"Mariposa, actually."

She had slipped onto the sofa next to him, tilting her head to look over, their positions strikingly similar to that they had been in that day on the hellicarrier. He asked nothing more. She said nothing else. A myriad of emotions went through his eyes too fast for her to identify; save for a shift of his mouth that meant had clenched his teeth, his face didn't change.

"She isn't part of a job. Neither is this place." His voice was low, his words were slow. "There is no job, is there?"

It was her who broke the stare, her eyes drifting shut. "No."

Before the word was finished Clint was on his feet. Instead of going down the stairs he went up, taking them two at a time. She followed, hanging back almost warily. Almost; for she was not wary. She wasn't quite sure what the feeling was; she merely wanted to see how the moment would play out.

The one that Banner had said would come.

Her hand trailing slowly along the banister, Natasha went up to the third floor at a more leisurely pace, one stair at a time.

The door to her bedroom was open as far as it would go. From her place in the hall she could see Barton kneeling once again, a hand outstretched to Mari, who had taken a seat on the carpet under a nightstand (which had nothing on top and was nailed to the wall, impossible to tip over). The girl had happily fallen forward, her meager weight easily balanced by the stronger hand.

"Those are my eyes, aren't they?"

Natasha didn't ask if he was aware that his voice had cracked. It would only add insult to the injury she caused.

To her silence he gave a soft laugh, a nervous noise, the sound that came from men pushed toward the edge of sanity, one that almost made Natasha fear for safety; for whose, Barton's, Mari's or her own, she was not certain.

"God _damn_." He used the hand that wasn't holding Mari up to rub his eyes, his face. "Those are _my eyes_."

All at once the archer tensed, his eyes wide in some sort of dark anticipation. (The look was unsettling; Natasha had only seen eyes that open on the faces of men who wore the look of fear before they died, fell to the ground, still looking frightened of the weapon that killed them even though it was long gone.) "Fury can't know of her." With a hustling pace that was somehow gentle, he had the girl gathered into his arms; defensive, posessive.

"That isn't rational and you know it."

The archer gave a lopsided smile. "It sounded stupid the second I said it. I know." The smile dropped from his face as he tipped his head, his focus on the girl who entertained herself with giving his collar an occasional tug. "Still..." His hands shook very slightly, similar to the way they did when his bow was under full tension; Mari didn't complain, there was no chance of her being held so tight.

"If Fury doesn't know," Natasha said gently. "someone worse will."

"If Fury does, _everyone will_. Maybe not _the worst_ but _the pretty damn bad_ isn't much consolation. You must have thought of this, 'tasha, you've been all the way out here on what you call _the edge of the world_ for the past however-the-hell-long." There came that laugh again. She took a step closer. Unsure whether a consoling hand to the shoulder or a slap would be more apropriate, she did neither, though she kept her hand raised, her arm half way extended from her body, ready to support or strike.

However she brought that hand down, her eyes looking at anything but the father-daughter pair. This is what Banner had meant. _This is what he had meant_. Somewhere in her red-soaked soul she had known all along. It was why she had carried the girl, kept the girl, raised the girl; If she had not, there would be a different man in front of her now. If he was on some sort of brink now, under the current circumstnaces, she would have, _almost had_ taken his feet, his _sanity_ out from under him. Banner was right; she _could_ have gone to any other fascility at a corner of the world of her choice. She hadn't.

"Banner hid you. Banner hid _her_. " Barton voiced, though his words were muffled; looking back at him, Natasha saw he had dipped his head so his forehead rested down on Mari's. His eyes were obscured, the embrace full, tight as he would allow. The man looked closer to breaking than he had waking from Loki's control, and he had looked pretty damn bad back then. "You asked him to, didn't you? Why?"

"I needed time."

"...Time. Yeah. Time is a good thing."

They fell into a silence. It was neither a comfortable quiet nor a turbulent one; somewhere in the middle, it made Natasha move at last, bringing that hand up to Barton's shoulder.

"Manhattan."

The archer looked up, brows arched in confusion above hazy eyes.

"Stark is the king of keeping things from Fury; more, she will be safe from the council that tells Fury _what_ to take. We go there, Manhattan, we stay there..."

"She stays safe." Barton said, then repeated it under his breath as if it was all he wanted to hear.

* * *

Remember, _this is no longer the last chapter_.


	6. Birds of a feather

I guess you could say this is the start of the "bonus chapters." Long overdue father-daughter fluff ahoy! ...after some Mari character building. Fluff is still the term for it, right; endearing domestic interaction? Either way, this is possibly the most tame, non-violent bit of prose I've ever written. No wonder this took so long!

**Fun fact ;** The method I use to try to keep the cast in character is that I play every piece of dialogue I write in the actor's voice in my head, while asking myself "is this something they would say?" Best part about that is I don't mind listening to Jeremy Renner _alllll _day long.  
**Fun fact #2 ;** The alternate title to this chapter is "_Heart_," and the little line at the end was inspired by Loki; _You have heart_. I kept the original chapter name, _Birds of a feather_, since this shows how like Barton Mari is.

Once again, many thanks to my good friend Kiki whose talks about living on an island came in handy for this.  
And to my mother, whose wanting to watch a mini-marathon of _Hulk,_ _Iron Man 2_ and _Captain America _put fresh vigor into my writing.  
And to Frank, who reminded me how much I loved the Outer Banks when he took me there last year.

And to reviewers, no matter the expressed opinion. :)

* * *

**" Birds of a feather "**

Tony Stark? Bruce Banner? Steve Rogers?

They were all well, fine and good when they were around the tower. Usually it was only Rogers, then Tony for most of the week along with that woman, Pepper. Banner came around the end of certain weeks in the month. When Banner was here she would shadow him instead of the other two; some said he was always angry but she always felt at ease, safe around him. His presence was soothing and he was rather willing to humor her, too.

She didn't spend _all_ of her time with them, though; first, everyone being in the tower was a rare occurance. Second, she didn't _live _there. Not in the tower.

After the intial joy of being in New York she began to miss North Carolina.

There were not as many cars in Avon, not like the New York traffic. There were beaches, not megalopolises. Sky and sea met on a blurred horizon line, not a skyline. There was sand and grass, the world was not an endless city; there were boundaries. A world she could understand, a world where she did not get lost the moment she left out of the house... A world where she actually _could_ leave the house. There were not anywhere near as many hiding places on the island there but it was home.  
Her home.  
Her parents walked with feet as silent as a cat's; even with both of them home, with no television or music the house could make so much ambient noise that it frightened her. With only one of them home it was almost a dead quiet; even worse. When neither was home _she_ could not be there. They, her folks, would never call in someone to stay there and watch her. The home in Avon? It was a secret place... or something like that. When her folks were called for work, they would be at the tower as a whole for one day. Her folks would leave for whatever work it was the next morning. The same went for the return trip, with a day spent in the tower (to rest and recover) before returning to the lovely Avon home by strange government plane. (Even if injuries were more severe, the waiting was only one day.) She understood the reasoning. That didn't mean she had to like it.

However, she did not whine or complain. That only made her feel worse; it never made the days go by faster. Besides, the tower wasn't half bad, with more space to explore.

Being up high was an interesting sensation.

Perhaps her true home made her love the high hiding places. So few lived permanently on the sandbar islands; if she wanted to be alone, a quick run up the dunes or back inside was all it took. Up on the dunes she could see all that walked on the beach and who boated at sea; back inside the home she could overlook other yards, parking lots and the single highway. No one saw her. She saw everything.

Of all the nooks, crannies, rooms, and other places in the gigantic tower, her favorite place was sitting on a support beam down in the lab. The hiding spot must have liked her, too, for she never had to enter codes like the adults did; it never occured to the girl that the omnipotent machine, Jarvis, may have been told to allow her inside. ("It's better than her triggering the security system and getting hurt. And getting two master assassins on _my _case because they can't exactly punch a home monitoring system." _Yes, sir. Quite understood._)

Up high, everyone's actions became clear. Where they once wandered the maze that was the room they had been in, since she could not see the aisles and shortcuts they took from ground level or from a chair, now she could follow their steps, see where they pivoted to avoid getting their side scraped by the corner of a worktable where she had once wondered how they moved it out of their way without it making a sound. No, no, Tony Stark wasn't some mutant whose power was intangibility; he simply arched his back in muscle memory to avoid the corner of his work bench, leaned to one side to avoid stumbling over the wheel of his office chair, and put a hand out to push back the robotic arm helper before the machine ended up smacking him in the jaw. (He talked to that machine like it was a person. Weird. Then again, didn't she talk to her dog?)

When the lab was busy with those floating plans all over the place she didn't go in; she was not completely convinced that they would not shock her, even though Stark had invited her to try out that one she could slip her arm in not too long ago. Just because that one did not shock her did not mean the rest never would. Besides, she had no time to toy with those floating plans. That spot, _her_ spot in the lab was up rather high; she had to grab a chair, climb onto a counter top, walk across, get on a storage bin and _then_ haul herself onto a support beam that may have been another form of storage at one point, like how auto shops had high shelves that cherry pickers and forklifts were needed to reach. She couldn't bring Sammy up with her when he was small. She, herself, needed to use her hands to climb and... well. Dogs don't have hands. Though as he got larger he could jump up where she had to climb, and she grabbed his collar to haul him up that last little bit into the final hiding place. On the other hand, having Sammy up there seemed to aggravate Stark, so Sammy stayed down on the ground, either laying in or around the fancy cars. (That didn't annoy Stark _as_ much.)

When the lab was not an option she would wander onto the floors above, often sitting in the corner of the elevator and enjoying the long ride up and down, at least until someone else needed to use it. Sometimes that was how she chose where she got on and off. With Sammy laying behind her, acting as a cushion, she would lean against the Shepherd mix dog, curl her knees and relax. Maybe her eyes would watch the electronic screen at the top of the elevator that counted up (or down) as they traveled; and when she wasn't watching the screen or the lights on the floor buttons themselves she had her head tilted back, her eyes closed, relaxed into a half-nap that would end when the car came to a stop at where she had told it to or when someone else had it open. That someone else was almost always Rogers; he was at the tower all the time. When it was not Rogers it would be one the duo of Stark and Banner, who always seemed to be going somewhere or coming back (while spouting words she couldn't even _dream_ of understanding to either each other, under their breath or on the phone. Thermo..nuclear..astro..theoretical..what).

Even if she didn't know what every word they said meant, she still followed them. With any of the other men out of the elevator she would clap her hands, would call Sammy to his feet before she followed into whatever floor the doors had opened to. Today, the duo was that of Stark and Rogers.

"Hey, it's the kid! What's on the agenda today, Mary?"

"It's _Ma_- oh, _whatever!_"

"Now you're learning."

She huffed at that. It just was not worth the effort of constantly correcting the man when it came to her name. Did it really matter? No, no it did not; even though it _did_ bother her. Often times she wondered if Stark did it on purpose. He probably did. "What're you guys doing?" The switch for one of the higher floors was hit. Either they were headed to one of the training floors or one of the lounge floors. The lounge floors had really big yet flat televisions. "Is there a ballgame? Not basketball, I hate that stuff. Football? Is there football?"

"Yes but it's no one important."

"So? We can still watch it. Even though I won't know anybody's names, it'll still be-"

"That isn't the reason, Mary." The elevator in this placed moved quickly; sometimes that made the ride fun, othertimes it seemed too short to be enjoyable. Before Stark had finished his statement the double doors were open. The building's desiger let himself out of the car, as was normal, though Rogers remained back and let her exit first. With Sammy at her side, Mari made sure to turn on her toes, grin back at, and thank him him for that.

"Today is the day to knock of a bit of rust."

"...I thought your suits didn't rust."

"Points for knowing your stuff," Once he stood beside thick, black double doors Stark entered security a code (that she was too short to see) to start the door's unlocking process; a sound of tumblers, gears and some sort of compressed air that ended with them opening at both sides like the entrance to a hangar. "However, no. This has nothing to do with the Mark 8 or any sort of rusting problem."

"Why is your suit named Mark? Aren't you named _St_ark?"

Oh no, was that a stupid question? Stark had done what many adults do when faced with a question that they could (or would) not snap an answer to; his eyes had closed, his head had tilted up, and he let out slow, dragging breath, more of a sigh. At once Mari had her hands clasped behind her back, unsure if it was something worth apologizing for or if it was better to forget it ever happened. She did the latter as the thick black doors settled in their opened state, flush alongside the wall as if they had been there all along. Leaning around Stark's legs she saw the interior to the new room was mainly shades of silver and grey; it made the room _seem_ cooler in temperature even though it was not.

"Though I do not like the modern implication of homicide," Rogers had said with a wary smile, one that looked quite handsome on him. "the phrase fits the situation; he'll kill you if he finds out you took her in there. Which he will. I'm not too thrilled about the idea myself."

"Who will go after Tony? A bad guy?"

Her remark was ignored by both men while Stark angled his head to look at Rogers, both of his brows raised, his head tilted. Mari wasn't quite sure how to interpret the look; sarcasitcally confident, or something of the sort.

After a brief shared glance Stark threw out a smirk. "So worth it."

"Stark-" Rogers' tone was low, warning, but the man was already walking into the new silver and gray room, a hand on Mari's back and his tongue clicking to call the yearling Shepherd mix dog along.

"What's this place? Is it new?"

"Not new at all."

"But it's shining."

"It's simply incredibly well looked after."

Through the hangar reminiscent doors opened up a rounded off rectangle of a room, the corners sloping around gently instead of ending in sharp edges. The walls themselves were either metal, drywall or mirror, no windows save for a few thin, longer-than-tall rectangular glass that ran near the ceiling. In the back and to the far left was a boxing ring, complete with the blue guard railing. A wide space and circular pattern dominated the middle of the floor while various other means of equipment (weight benches, tredmills, and things she had no names for) dominated the right wall. The walls adjacent to the doors themselves were dominated by tall cabinents, cubbeys, tables, display cases and gun safes. (She knew what the last were from movies that no one said she couldn't see; if anything, her mother purposely left them on television.)

"Stark, I strongly suggest that you rethink possibly-"

"You think I'm going to arm the kid and put her in the ring?"

Rogers was taken aback and paused, considering his words. "Well, you _were_ planning, designing some sort of prototype in relation to her. Barton took out his frustration about that on a few targets you saw in the trash before he left last month."

"The foam torsos?"

"The gel."

"Ah, yes, I remember those shredded pices of almost-flesh. What did Hawkboy use to take out his frustration, a pistol? FMJs or standard rounds? Or did he stick with his bow?"

While Stark wandered toward the boxing ring, Rogers turned on one heel and tapped the glass of the nearest display case.

"Bowie knife."

"Wait, why do we even have one of those?"

"Natasha."

"Good god that is ten times more frightening." He didn't really sound afraid; or maybe he was. Mari couldn't tell; she paid little attention by then. Rogers was being summoned into the ring by Stark, who was reaching behind the ring to grab at a case where the pads and gloves were probably stored. Meanwhile, with Sammy at her heels, Mariposa had wandered over to those tables she had seen while walking in. The chairs didn't roll like the ones in the lab; those were the collapsable sort. One was already set up for use. She could easily get onto the table without help; the chair being pulled and left out acted as a stepping stool for Sammy. With his tail wagging, the dog ascended. With him laying by the wall and her sitting in front of his belly, they took their places like they often did in the elevator.

Ah, so Stark had meant that they were going to spar to keep from getting rusty- to keep from losing reaction time among other things. Stark had on gloves and pads; Rogers had the gloves but none of the other protective gear. He didn't need it, based on the stories she had heard. There may have been a specific goal to the exercise but all Mari saw was a boxing match between "Iron Man" and "Captain America," where the latter looked to be superior. (The phrase _let's go a few rounds_ was some sort of inside joke between them or something.) Stark was throwing left and right hooks, Rogers was holding his punches; she had no fighting experience yet she could tell.

The dull thuds from both the connecting blows (where Stark was opting for a bit of leg movement, kicks that Rogers also blocked with relitave ease) and Sammy's wagging tail (which drummed on the table) distracted her from the ambient noise of the home. Silence made her find something to focus on, and those noises... The natrual creaks and groans of any building set her on edge, even moreso when those were combined with the mechanical hums of the countless lights, working machines, Jarvis and the Iron Man suits themselves. The thumps of Sammy's tail, the strikes from the padded fists and shoes, they were almost reminiscent of the clock in her room that lulled her to sleep every night. One, two, three, four... Also akin to her routine in the elevator, she may have let her eyes slip shut and her head rest on the silver/grey wall...

Most of the way asleep, a new set of thuds from the floor below brought some of her awareness back. Her eyes still closed and herself still relaxed against the dog, the wall, she listened, casting her attention away from the boxing match and toward those new sounds. They stopped after a while. She would have shrugged had she been awake. Right then, it felt like too much effort.

Those new thuds started up again, this time just down the hall. Footsteps, that's what they were, quiet, casual footsteps.

Before she realized the footsteps had gotten any closer, they were upon her, in the room. A hand was placed on her head. Soothing. She leaned into it, making a soft sound of recognition. Beside her, Sammy's tail started up again. Of course it would. This wasn't just a person who had come up, it was her father; the hand may not have been the softest, it was quite coarse from that bow and scars from enemy weapons, but there was an indescribable sensation of safety whenever it was on her head or around her.

It was nice to hear his unique voice - not deep yet not high, not gravely but with a sort of drag - talking to her after a month. It felt like longer, so much longer... "The others bore the life out of me, as well. I don't blame you for going to sleep."

"Not boring." She mumbled, bringing up an arm to wrap around that hand, holding in place. "I'm just tired..."

"Want to go upstairs...?"

The trail off had her eyes open in a flash, though she had to blink a few times to fix her vision. She tilted her head up, smiling like a happy yet lazy cat. She knew the rest of the question, her father knew she would be more than happy to answer. Heck, he already knew her choice; he just wanted to hear it. Fine with her, she wanted to say it. "...or do I wanna sleep on the plane?"

Her father nodded.

"I can sleep on th'plane." She sat up, leaned forward, loosened her arm's grip, and put her forehead against her father's shoulder, a task made easy by her elevation on the table. The hand that was on her head changed so that it was on her back, so that she was being picked up. Even before the man chuckled she had predicted the noise, predicted what he was going to say; "Do they ever feed you? You still don't weigh a thing."

"I stole some of Tony's steak last week," she replied with a lazy slur. "And Sammy got into his drink while he shooed me away. Tony got so mad. It was worth it."

Barton gave no verbal reply but the hand stroking the back of her head said enough; _that's my girl._

* * *

Up on the dunes she could see all that walked on the beach and who boated at sea. The sandbar islands of the Outer Banks were known for their moving dunes, the mountains of sand that often raced across the road like dry, dangerous snow and were never in the same place from one year to the next. It was possible to walk from one shore to the next in a matter of moments, with the islands being far, _far_ longer than they ever would be wide. From the front porch of the much missed Avon home she could turn left, rush down the line of homes used for summer vacations and winter escapes, go up the smaller dune, and she would catch sight of the water trapped between the sandbar and the Carolina shore. Going in the opposite direction, turning right outside of the home, running across Highway 12, through the parking lot to the reality agency and a few more homes, she was already back at the water, this time the Atlantic sea. In the time it took to go from bay to sea she could only go a few blocks back in New York. Like a dog who had gotten lost in the world only to return home, she much preferred the limited, normal surroundings.

Sammy sometimes stayed in New York; he was still being trained by Rogers, who was his _real_ owner... though she liked him (the dog, that is) and Rogers did not seem to mind whenever she sought out Sammy's company. With the pup still in the tower, that left only herself and her father back at home.

What was bad about that? Nothing. Nothing at all.

There were a few families, couples, singles and pets wandering the sand below, most of them off to the right since the island came to a sloping end on the left. (To the south beyond Avon lay the rocky, often empty shore of Pea Island, too rocky to walk on in standard issue flip-flops.) She knelt in the most peaceful spot; most of the way up a dune (which was not _supposed_ to be climbed according to local law but no one cared) there was an area where the sand flattened out, as if there was solid ground not too far below the surface that allowed a ledge-like area to form. Sitting in the solid dip in the dune, she could tug bits of the rough beach grass out by their roots and attempt to draw in the dry sand, knowing those efforts would be futile but enjoying it all the same.

"What was that one? The wind blew before I turned to look."

"Sammy. But I made his nose too big..."

"But he does have a big nose."

She clenched her jaw to suppress the laughs but failed, letting out a sharp breath before throwing her head back. She was not sure why people said her father had a "dry" sense of humor. Whenever he made a remark, just as he had done there, it was funny. He knew when he was doing it, he did. _Dry_ was another word for _dull_ and the man beside her certainly wasn't either. Almost surreal was the image of him in civilian clothing, a pale red shirt and capris shorts, as compared to the battle gear he was normally seen in. The sunglasses remained the same, the frame a pitch black and the lenses reflecting a strange red color in the light. Where she sat in the sand any way she wished, he had one knee on the ground to support his weight while he had the other one bent, an arm being rested over that knee. He seemed to enjoy high places, wide vantage points, anything off the ground; perhaps that was why he also enjoyed life at the tower and the beach home, why he would raise his brows (as opposed to sneer) at the idea of a normal home. The tower was obvious, with its numerous floors rising skyward; even the Avon home was better than a normal one with a basement that may go underground. There was a good ten feet's clerance due to those poles meant to keep the flood waters at bay.

The way her father sat, that knee bent and the other under him, It looked like he was going to assume the starting position of an olympic runner at any moment; maybe he was used to having to spring to his feet and run. That was not an image she liked.

In between watching the crab fishers out at sea and the stray cat on the beach below, she had shifted so that she rested her back against the leg her father had bent. Sitting perpendicular to him she turned her head, resting her temple on his knee; at the same time the hand that been draped across that knee moved, wrapping around her. "Why are there so many bad guys?"

"Hm?"

"Bruce says you all go away to stop the bad guys. You and mom can be gone for an awful long time. There must be a lot of bad guys. Mom's still fighting them..."

She was met with silence; an odd type of silence, neither the frightening sort that came with the lack of movement at home nor the tense, awkward sort when two people weren't sure what to say next. The lack of response meant Barton was thinking; perhaps he had his thoughts collected and was choosing his words. Mari shifted so she was hugging his arm and leaning into it. She did not mind waiting; she was patient.

Barton momentarially tightened the embrace before easing, his fingers curling and relaxing to make soothing circles on her back; like a kitten in the lap of luxury, she paid little attention to anything else.

"There is more to it than that."

Now it was her turn. "Hm?"

"Yes, you have a bit right. There are many types of people. There are the good, the bad, the downright insidious..." He trailed off and exhaled a breath, thick and heavy, as if he did not like what he was about to say; Mari had opened her eyes and glanced up at him, though the sunglasses prevented her from reading his expression. "There are also good people forced to do bad things."

"So you're not always fighting bad guys, sometimes you're helping the good ones."

"That's pretty much how it works."

"...then why don't you sound happy? You mumbled, dad. Not the good kind, either."

"Your mother and I are usually sent as a last resort."

"Last resort... that means when nothing else works, right?"

He nodded.

"I... don't really understand."

"We don't do much saving, kid." Barton murmured. Raising his free hand he removed the sunglasses, curling that arm so he ran the back of his hand across his face to brush off sweat and sand. "By the time we arrive to deal with the problem, people don't _want_ to be saved. It's... It wears on you, watching people destroy themselves. My opinion sometimes differs from SHIELD's; everyone deserves a second chance. What they do with that is what matters."

"Have you given a lot of people a second chance?"

"Some."

"Did they turn out good in the end?"

"...Yes," Barton said after hesitation. That arm he had wrapped around her moved as he pat her on the head twice. His hand lingered on her head. Still sitting down, she leaned into it. Her eyes closed, she did not see the way his mouth twitched up into a smile. With the stiff beach grass she still held in her hands she doodled again, looking down at the sand by her feet.

"What is it this time?" Barton leaned away from her so he could peer down, that hand of his hovering in air where it once touched her head.

"A heart." The dry sand had compressed the image sightly but the grooves were still there, the shape still visible. "'Cuz you've got a good one."


	7. Sentimentality

Hello there, everyone! It's good to be back!  
Don't think I forgot about this series, oh no, I didn't. However, after writing _Birds of a Feather_ and _When he screams part 2_, it had been a couple of months since I had seen _The Avengers_ and I felt I was losing my touch when it came to Barton. I own every movie thus far, so I could refresh on just about anyone... but Barton. (A cameo in _Thor_ does not a reference make.)  
BUT a bunch of theaters put _The Avengers_ back in over Labor Day weekend and I sprung to see it at a little community theater where tickets were only $4USD. A nice deal, no?

This one is short compared to the other ones, maybe around the same length as the first chapter, the original "Two Evils" oneshot. This was written in about three hours and is just to get myself back into the universe.

Thank you all for your reviews and being understanding. :)

* * *

**"Sentimentality"**

* * *

It was obvious they had not been prepared. They were lucky, whoever this target group was and whoever they were affiliated with. Had Fury not seen a red flag sent up by SHIELD's extensive research department, which caught the faces of agents of some terrorism group at various airports, and had Fury not sent an agent to intercept the attack, well then... That poor group of business tycoons would have been, for lack of a better word, toast. At the same time, the poor quality of the enemy's work almost made Barton curl his mouth into a grin and part his jaws in a laugh. He would have, too, if the pulse from his chest as he laughed would not throw off the aim of his bow.

He had been aiming at a duo of men that had been working to set up a stand and cover for a sniper rifle. To the casual observer and buff of spy thriller books and movies, they had done an alright job. To his own eyes, sharp as a hawk's and much better at a distance, the effort was pitiful. Perhaps it was the fact that he knew _who_ he was to look for, and how their methods had been spelled out in SHIELD's manila folder packets, not to mention their faces, but he had seen the duo enter their chosen building and tracked them with ease. It was his job to make sure they didn't come out.

Reminiscent of a scene in a movie he had once seen, where a hunter tracked a target only to find _himself_ a prey item, Barton lifted his face away from where he had an arrow pulled back at full tension; something was't quite right. One man was loading the sniper rifle; another filed through a briefcase where there were multiple sights. It would have been a simple enough shot, one arrow through the throat of the man with the briefcase would have the second man turning his head to see why his fellow fell. While the man had the back of his neck exposed, Barton would notch, release and watch as a second arrow did its good work.

However, it wasn't always _that_ easy. Most of the time, yes, but occasionally an enemy group would have someone intelligent on their staff. Someone who could, say, know to look out for a domestic sniper assigned to guard that group of chatting tycoons.

Skylines big or small (small in this case) caused shadows that looked different from every angle, changed due to weather conditions plus the time of day and year, and could change constantly from constrction and destruction. Despite that, Barton considered himself adept at keeping tabs on his surroundings. Nothing got by the eyes of Hawkeye.

Nothing.

So when one shadow failed to vanish after clouds moved out of the way of the afternoon sun, Barton's eyes had flashed over to it under the shadow of a hat. There was no need for the sunglasses; he was indoors, at the top floor of an office building which was led to belive they had rented this office out to a small business meeting. It could have been a simple trick of the time, a weight bearing pole whose shadow had lengthened due to the later hour, but he was not fooled. That shadow had no reason to be there.

Quickly, Barton put his eye back to the bow and let out the first of the shots. Down below, the man had chosen the sight he wished to install onto the rifle. Both he and the sight went down, both flopped unceremoniously onto the floor, the sight abandned and the man with an arrow in his jugular. The second man whipped his head around; the muscle on his neck twitched as if he had yelled. While Barton sensed movement from behind him through his peripherals, he took time to fire off the second arrow. There was no need to double check; he knew the target would be taken care of. The only thing he had to worry about was retrieving the two arrows before someone else could, and fending off whoever this third adversary turned out to be.

A bow was no good at close range as anything other than a club, and he certainly did not want to harm the masterful crafting that was his bow. Quickly, Barton dropped to his toes so he could lay the bow on the ground behind him and draw out his knife in one single, deadly motion.

One on one. Similar height, similar weight- Barton had no doubt at all that he would come out victorious. If director Fury had felt there was a chance of failure, then there would have been someone else sent with him, a partner, a shadow, something. There had not been. He was alone, a raptor on his perch about to fight off the last of a group of invading scavangers.

He witheld the use of the kife for the time being and focused on using his free (and paded) hand to block the other man's blade. With the knife deflected, Barton would lash out with a kick. His first kick missed and he narrowly missed a slice to his side. The knife cut the fabric of his business coat and drew a thin red line down his ribs. Papers of sorts slipped from the damaged inner pocket, from false identification such as the driver's license he had been using to the agreement he flashed to show it was he who had supposedly rented the room. Each paper had been sliced down the corners and the driver's license limination was badly damaged. Along with those papers, one other fell to the floor in similar, red-stained, shredded scrap. The sight of that last paper made Barton ground his teeth and lash out; this time, his kick did _not_ miss.

Time after time, in what could not have been longer than ten seconds, he deflected blows and had landed his own blows on the enemy's shins and thighs to where Barton noticed a limp forming in the man's left leg. He focused the strikes, and when he got the man to stumble backward and reach out to grab a windowsil for balance, Barton turned the knife in his hand so he could use the blunt end. He hauled the enemy forward by the collar of his jacket and slammed the butt of the knife into his neck, into a pessure point Barton had long since memorized. Grabbing his bow or actually stabbing would have been reckless- a clean-up team would have been needed and he doubted the rental company would have accepted the excuse of wine on the carpet instead of blood. At worst it would just have been an extra stack of paperwork on Fury's desk, but Barton knew how much Fury hated red tape.

Best save Nick the trouble and make the cleanup easy.

"All clear," Barton murmured into the standard issue earpiece. At the same time he knelt down and began to gather what had once been in his pockets and the hat that had fallen off of his head.

"_What's the concensus?_"

"Minor injuries, nothing I can't dress on my own. Three targets- two dead and one incapacitated. Latter is in the room I was stationed."

"_Good work. We'll have those arrows back to you before the day's end._"

"Alright... Thanks, Hill."

The lease, the driver's license, the internet directions to this building he had printed out to give him the appearance of harmlessness, all of them were placed in an envelope to be disposed of later. (Perhaps he would burn them.) The stained paper, however, the one that had been closest to his person and had taken what little blood had been drawn... Barton put back on the fedora and ran a hand down his forehead, his temple, until his palm covered his mouth in obvious frustration. Of all things, why did the bastard have to ruin that? It was nothing more than a drawing on thick, children's construction paper, folded so the crayon image could easily be tucked away in a bag or pocket. While that third man had not been aiming for the paper, specifically, Barton still felt an emotional slight at the damage. He could unfold the construction paper without it falling apart, though the image on the inside was separated into puzzle like pieces by gaps that opened up like a paper snowflake. It it had _meant_ to be a paper snowflake, that was one thing, but.. Even if he taped it back together, there was still the mess with his blood. He couldn't carry that around anymore.

Barton took time to give his minor wound a quick clean and put a windbreaker on top of his ripped business coat. As he turned to leave the room and then the building, he sent a look back at the unconscious man on the floor.

Barton could imagine the raised eyebrow and incredulous tone that Fury would have if he had been in the room at that moment, or if Barton had brought up the damage in a meeting later. "You ruin a damned expensive cover suit, you fire two arrows that are a part of a multi-million dollar crafting process, you force a second agent in to clean up the guy you KOed, and you're upset over _that?_"

"Yeah, I am," Barton murmured under his breath in response to Fury's demands in his head. "Because you stuck me in Washington DC for three months, standard op lack of contact with anyone outside of the mission. I've done enough of these things to be used to it but, dammit,_ my girl _drew that for me, left it taped on the door the night before I left, and that bastard's gone and ruined it. Don't think you can put an extra year or two on his sentence for that, can 'ya?"

That last comment had been half pessimistic and half joke. Shaking his head at his sensitivity, Barton closed the door to the meeting room behind him and proceeded down the hall with the other tenants being none the wiser.


End file.
